Elderly neighbour acting odd, knocking on doors in nightclothes

[Eggyhair]

A neighbour from a few houses away, has always been nosey and a bit of a gossip.

When DD was at primary, we walked past their house twice a day and they (her and her husband), would always stop to talk to us. She also spoke to my parents a lot, before dad died.

A few weeks ago, DD & I were waiting for a friend to pick us up and she came out. She said she was being nosey and asked who we were and how long we'd been here. I told her I'd been here for 14 years and DD all her life and said she should probably didn't recognise DD as she'd grown (she's 12 and doesn't look that different, but was being charitable, not sure why she didn't remember me).

I had a supermarket delivery and the driver said she was asking him for forms to get deliveries. He told her she'd need to do it online, but she said she doesn't have the internet and wanted to do it by forms. She then kept walking up and down, till he went. Same with my next delivery.

This afternoon (4pm), she knocked on my door, wearing a nightie, dressing gown and slippers. She asked for a male name I'd never heard of and know no one who lives on our road has. She then asked who I was and where I came from. I said I came from my house (as I was a bit confused by what she meant). She said not to mind her, that she was drunk! She then asked about a funeral, confirmed I wasn't the male she was seeking and went. I asked if she was OK, she said she was, but I watched her home.

I'm guessing social services would be the best bet? It would be very difficult to talk to her husband (who I rarely see, as he had a femur operation recently).

Not sure what else to do. I'm assuming dementia, unless she is alcoholic, which doesn't seem likely (and she didn't appear drunk at all, just confused).

Read the whole thread. OP was simply suggesting, as a concerned bystander, making adult social services aware that a vulnerable person was possibly at risk. She very well may be. The tedious safeguarding nitpicking came in when Hatgirl queried what she expected social services to do, as if it had nothing whatsoever to do with them.

No one has managed to answer my question, would it be reasonable to let a child wander around putting themselves at risk? If not, why would it be reasonable for a person with moderate to severe dementia?

Spot on.

Safeguarding with a capital 'S' might be a statutory term, but safeguarding with a small 's' isn't.

What would you do if you found a confused and vulnerable elderly woman wandering the streets in her nightie? Ignore her?

Like anyone in the public sector, social workers are trying to do their best in a system chronically under funded and under resourced

Some are. People have given their experiences on the thread. It's not always the case that public sector workers are "trying to do their best". No argument that the system is underfunded and under resourced, but that doesn't mean they are beyond any criticism for their action or inaction.

How is she harming herself? she is walking to her neighbours house which is only likely a few doors down from her own home. She has a husband who may be providing a caring role.

She and her husband, would likely require an adult social care assessment and she would benefit from a memory test from the GP. It certainly is not a safeguarding.

@Ereshkigalangcleg another poster said OP should raise a safeguarding. @hatgirl was responding to this, not "nitpicking", but politely explaining. You have responded rudely to this, slagging off social workers.

So you think someone who receives a dementia diagnosis should be treated like a 5 year old child?! How dare you! How rude! I think you'll find there are differences!

Also, no one appears to have clarified if the lady in question even has dementia, so you are jumping the gun to defend your position (of bashing the social worker). If this has only been happening in the last week or two the lady might simply have a UTI (this creates dementia like symptoms in older people) and she may simply need some antibiotics and be right as rain (whereas if you were the social worker (heaven forbid!) you would have locked her up in a care home! Social work is a much harder and complicated job than you may think!

You have no clue.

Do you expect adult social care to grab this woman and her put in a care home?

How is she harming herself? she is walking to her neighbours house which is only likely a few doors down from her own home. She has a husband who may be providing a caring role.

She and her husband, would likely require an adult social care assessment and she would benefit from a memory test from the GP. It certainly is not a safeguarding.

How would anyone know what is or isn't in place if they don't look into it? How do they know if people don't first raise a concern?

@safetyfreak she is putting herself in harm’s way and extremely vulnerable if she is wandering the streets at night in her nightie

So you think someone who receives a dementia diagnosis should be treated like a 5 year old child?! How dare you! How rude! I think you'll find there are differences!

I know full well how vulnerable dementia can make a person. You can hide behind your jargon all you want.

Hatgirl was extremely dismissive, that's why she got the reaction she did, from multiple posters.

Do you expect adult social care to grab this woman and her put in a care home?

It's quite possible that level of care is necessary if her husband isn't able to care for her and she can't take care of herself, as you surely will know. However, in the first instance, they should check she is actually receiving adequate care, no?

Adult services doesn't work like children's service for those trying to make the comparison with children.

Consent and capacity are important . Adults, even with dementia are not children.

This isn't a situation where this lady is lost and distressed (which would require a police response in the first instance). She's on her own street, in the vicinity of her own house, with her husband nearby.

Being in your nighty at 4pm on your own street is confusion. Not harm. Not abuse. Not neglect.

There are lots of older couples living in this type of situation with just some support from their GP and local memory team.

The single most useful thing the OP can do as a neighbour is try and speak to the husband, ask if he's got support, and offer to pass on the details for adult social care, or make a referral with his consent if he suggests he would like some help.

Raising a safeguarding alert isn't the correct thing to do. Making a referral with consent from the adults involved is the correct thing to do.

Only on mumsnet can you get called a fantasist for clarifying what the actual law is.

4pm is late? OP has not mentioned the lady wandering at night time.

She comes out of her home, talks to the nighbours then goes back home it seems.

OP reporting her concern to social services is the right thing to do though, as there may be some measures they can put in place to support her husband.

There are lots of older couples living in this type of situation with just some support from their GP and local memory team.

There is absolutely no way that my grandmother with dementia and her incapacitated partner would be ok with that. It depends on the people involved. But I'm sure you can deal with all that when a member of the public calls to report a concern about a potentially vulnerable adult, rather than quote social services jargon at them and tell them to go away.

@Ereshkigalangcleg no one said they would be told to go away. I'm calling troll.

The response has been extremely dismissive. "What do you expect social services to do?" Was Hatgirl's response, before anyone mentioned "a safeguarding".

Grow up. I'm not a troll.

WTF, you can't post that!

You do know troll hunting is against the rules?

Unless it’s a UTI, sounds like classic signs of dementia to me - I’ve seen far too much of it. One relative of mine started knocking on a neighbour’s door (in Berkshire) in her nightie at 2 am, asking to be driven to Scotland.

But it can be extraordinarily difficult to put any sort of help in place, not least because people will so often refuse to accept that there’s anything wrong with them (often not ‘denial’ as such - they simply can’t remember that they can’t remember anything) and will not uncommonly refuse entry to anyone who turns up at the door.

I’d have thought that at this stage, informing any relatives that there seems to be a problem, would be a first step, and then for such relatives to arrange - if possible - a visit to the GP, first to check for a UTI, and (having informed the GP on the quiet that dementia is a possibility) preliminary tests for it, if GPs still do such things.

But (speaking from too much experience) all too often there are no easy answers.

Ereshkigalangcleg isn't a troll. She and I have perfectly pleasant conversations on other topics when I'm not using this user name.

Which is why I am so disappointed in the personal attacks and downright rudeness she has engaged in during this discussion and possibly why she thinks I am being dismissive when actually I'm trying to not to rise to the name calling and misinformation from a poster I previously had a lot of respect for.

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER Exactly my experience. Those saying she needs urgent help do not understand that there just isn't a solution, even when all the help available is being accessed. People have to muddle through until a care home becomes unavoidable. Dementia is messy and hard.

Hatgirl you specifically said it was none of OP's business because her husband was probably caring for her, something neither you nor OP have any way of knowing. OP has already said it's difficult to speak to the husband, so surely a concern about a potentially (likely) vulnerable adult should be looked into? IMO you were really quite dismissive.

And I've already suggested that the general approach and current government guidelines are at fault, not just individual social workers. But no, like many people here my experiences with social workers, both working with them and dealing with them on behalf of family members, have not been great. Undoubtedly a lot of it is down to the system, yes, but it doesn't mean that social workers are beyond criticism, or their processes are.

Yes, @Firecat, people who are utterly clueless about the practical realities of dementia are all too often very keen to tell other people how to cope with/manage it.